TechRepublic/Gartner: Vendors to work together on common desktop and application suite for Linux

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"Sun Microsystems has joined other major vendors in supporting
the GNOME Foundation to create a Linux-based desktop, including
open source productivity application services (PAS). ... Sun has
committed to making the GNOME desktop the standard for Solaris in
2001. Although significant to UNIX desktop users, Gartner believes
that Linux on the desktop and Linux PAS will make little headway in
the United States—except where Linux is an embedded operating
system for appliances whose primary interface is the Internet
browser. Outside the United States where Microsoft is less
entrenched (e.g., China), a Linux-based desktop and PAS could find
opportunities. The GNOME Foundation and OpenOffice Foundation raise
the level of competition with Microsoft but only a little."

"The announcement has more significance for Web-based PAS and
productivity service developers. The GNOME project will provide
a component system, XML file interchange standards and filters for
other file formats. This announcement represents the open source
threat to Microsoft's Windows.NET. However, a notable absence
from the GNOME project's list of technology is
synchronization—a clear requirement for effective Web
PAS."

"Although multivendor cooperative projects do not have a
stellar history of success, the open source movement is the best
vehicle yet for derailing partisanship. ... The announcement
is a good first step, but as with Windows.NET, the availability of
services is essential to its success... The GNOME project has
focused on UNIX; to succeed, the focus must shift to the Web."